Luerkens makes initial appearance in Marion Hy-Vee stabbing death

CEDAR RAPIDS - Police have surveillance video that shows Nicholas Luerkens stabbing Lynnsey Donald in a Marion grocery store parking lot last week, according to a criminal complaint filed Monday.

Witnesses saw Luerkens, 32, stab Donald, 29, multiple times with a large knife in the parking lot of the Marion Hy-Vee, according to the complaint. Donald died from the injuries. The attack was also witnessed by others in the vicinity, and the surveillance video is from a nearby store.

Luerkens, of 600 Ashton Place NE, Apt. 106, Cedar Rapids, who made his initial appearance by video from the Linn County Jail, was formally charged with first-degree murder Monday in Linn County District Court.

Sixth Judicial Associate District Judge Casey Jones changed his $1 million bail to be cash-only, as requested by Assistant Linn County Attorney Monica Slaughter.

Slaughter said Luerkens is a 'serious danger to the public.” She termed the public stabbing a 'heinous crime” and said she thought Luerkens' family may have retained private counsel for him, so she was concerned he might have the financial resources to make bail.

Luerkens, appearing in a suicide smock, told the judge he was going to fill out an application for court-appointed counsel. That was the only time Luerkens spoke during the hearing. He mostly looked down.

Sara Smith, representing the Linn County Public Defender's office, asked the judge to leave the bail as cash or surety, saying it was high and making it cash only was 'excessive and redundant.” She also indicated Luerkens may be represented by a public defender.

Members of Donald's family attended the hearing. Her family members were visibly upset as they sat at the back of the small courtroom.

Luerkens is on suicide watch, Col. John Stuelke with the Linn County Sheriff's Office, verified after the hearing. He said it's standard policy that any jail inmate facing a possible life sentence or long prison time start out on suicide watch, as a precaution. Such suspects are in a single cell and are regularly monitored by jail personnel and a mental health nurse and psychiatrist provide treatment, if needed.

Luerkens was arrested Sunday after being released from the hospital. According to police, he tried to kill himself, stabbing himself in the abdomen, after stabbing Donald. He underwent surgery and had been in the hospital since Tuesday, when the incident occurred.

Family members previously said Donald's 7-year-old son, Ashton, was one of the witnesses who saw the fatal stabbing, but that information it wasn't included in Monday's complaint.

Marion investigators say Donald and Luerkens once lived together, but that she moved out months ago. Her relatives described him as a former boyfriend of hers.